Team Gray!

We spent our second 4th with our neighbors, Mel, Earlene, and kids, and Katie and Mitchell. These are our black neighbors. The white neighbors are all around, and they get together and do things. We’re just starting to get together with the black neighbors and do things.

Like double dutch. I’ve been trying to master this for years, and was thrilled last Wednesday, when Lillian showed up at the park with a double dutch rope.

I didn’t care that it was 110 in the shade; I was trying to get the hang of it! It surprised me how aloof Yanni was, and how standoffish the other girls were. Only the boys with us were willing to try double dutch. Yanni was pressed into twirling until she just abandoned ship and went into the nearby library.

But, this week at New Genesis, the big girls learned double dutch. Big Joy, one of said neighbors, is in that class, and Yanni just happened to be a youth volunteer this week, so guess what? She’s now all into double dutch.

We practiced for most of the 4th. And our other neighbors commented on how they wanted to see me give it a try. They were lying, but whatever. These 40 year old bones had more fun than I’ve had for a long time. I jumped until my shins hurt. I twirled until I thought I’d drop the rope from fatigue.

And then we went to find Earlene. Joy’s mother grew up in Brooklyn. We knew she must know a thing or two about double dutch. She did not disappoint. The first thing she did was solve our rope problem. We’d been trying to twirl and jump ropes of uneven weights, and it was throwing everything off. Curtis had brought out some cable and computer cords that were a good weight, but a little too short. Earlene combined the two ropes we’d been using, and thought we could make the cable work. We were in business!

Both Earlene and I had been chastised in our youth as folks who couldn’t quite twirl. They called it clap-handed up here. They called it double-handed in New York. She wiped invisible tears from her eyes as she gathered her courage to enter the double dutch arena again. We eventually coaxed Earlene to jump in–heels and all!

Joy wanted to jump until dark, but she was competing with all the other kids, who were ready for fireworks. Our next door neighbors were sharing sparklers with Imani, Joy and Esteban, and joined in on the delight of the colored smoke bombs at our house.

As darkness gathered, Earlene and I went to get Katie and Mitchell for the fountains and bottle rockets. The crowd that usually gathers down the street was gathering, and we watched as our next door neighbors walked down to join the other white people on the block.

And, as happens every year, we competed with our neighbors for our light show. They had showier fireworks this year, but the bases were unstable. One of the more spectacular rockets fell over after it was lit, shooting the fireworks into someone’s lawn.

We are getting used to taking turns lighting the fireworks. We left the whole show in the hands of our 12 and 13 year old children. I must say that they could work on their timing. . .

Every year I regret how segregated the whole fourth celebration turns out. But, on the other hand, I am not willing to change up my culture to blend into someone else’s. We still don’t have all the black people on the block over, yet. Maybe that’s what we should shoot for.

I was corralling my kittens, er, kids through the library today, when we stumbled upon an Amish couple exiting the elevator. um, elevator?

I was so taken aback, that I attempted to walk down the stairs with three small children, even a 3-year old. I had to ‘represent’ for the Amish people of America.

Well, we’re all done with our New Genesis computer class.

I can still smell the computers and wall unit air conditioner if I breathe in too hard.

The week with the boys was fouled up because of scheduling. They were supposed to go swimming the first three days, so we didn’t really have the boys in the morning until Thursday. Then they went on a field trip on Friday.

Monday morning, while I was typing up our schedule for the week, I got an email about the swimming schedule. It said that the little boys would swim on Monday morning, and the older boys would swim on Tuesday morning. I called my volunteers and canceled them, and then drove Curtis and Imani to the building for their day.

Imagine our surprise when we opened the door to the computer room and found little boys in there! We talked to Pastor Armstrong and told him that I had told my volunteers not to come, and he sent the little boys and their expert handlers outside for a game of kickball for an hour and 15 minutes. Meanwhile, Curtis got to spend time in the lab with the older boys.

Pastor Armstrong assured us that the boys would swim on Tuesday.

I didn’t have to do anything with the boys outside, so I watched them off and on and I watched Imani and her cheerleading class. The little girls remembered me, and I tried to stay off to the side so I wouldn’t be disruptive.

I was responsible for the little boys in the lab by myself, and I got weak in the knees. I asked Curtis to help me, and afterward, we agreed that I would take all the boys in the play room, and he could stay in the computer room. I didn’t think I’d be able to stave them off of the internet all week long.

Meanwhile, the boys had their whole afternoon class in the computer room, taught by other volunteers. I took the 4-5 shift, which was the older boys in the computer room.

One day, the volunteers before us caved in and let them get on the internet. I then had to police them for an hour as they tried to run out in front of a bus! The more savvy of the boys knew all over the internet, and were constantly wandering off the acceptable path. Curtis went in and locked it all down after that, and he also talked to the other volunteer to get him to not do that again.

Tuesday morning, the boys left for swimming and couldn’t get into the pool. We weren’t responsible for them. They were supposed to swim on Wednesday, but this time I didn’t say anything to my volunteers. My volunteers showed up on Wednesday to find that the boys had gone swimming.

Since he really only had a couple days with the boys, Curtis was unable to do the web page project with them. He did let them explore Windows Moviemaker, though, and the afternoon volunteer taught power point.

I noticed some interesting differences between boys and girls. In the play room, if all the girls weren’t involved in a game, some would get distracted and do something else, pulling everyone else off task. We couldn’t play any games where someone got out, for example. The boys could get out, and then they’d watch and cheer for their comrades still in the game.

The older girls cooperated and played the robot games in the play room, but the boys went through the motions and then it all disintegrated. That could very well have been my lack of discipline, and not a reflection on them at all. I ended up taking them outside to play kickball, and after male volunteers set the game up, I could sit back and watch, mediate a fight, and tell them when it was time to go.

I found that I didn’t like working with either group of older children. I came to call the 4-5 slot ‘the hour from hell.’ Those kids had been there a long time, and the last thing they wanted to do was argue with me about getting on the internet. I got a lot of –”can I go to the bathroom? Can I get some water? Can I get a snack? Can I go?”

Pastor Armstrong wants to continue the 4-5 slot as an option for the children at the end of the day. I’m not feeling it, the way it went the first two weeks. But, if the children there want to be there, and they want to create something on the computer, rather than just go into chat rooms, etc., it could work out fine.